Photographs from One Year
Nicholas Nixon
The Friends of Photography (Untitled 31), 1983, 48 pages
ISBN 0-933286-33-3
Nicholas Nixon photographed these black & white images in more than 25 different towns and cities over the course of just one year. These photos can be mistaken for snapshots at first glance, but they were all shot with an 8x10 inch view camera.
The unconventional tableaus presented in these images are endlessly fascinating. Consider the cover photograph: the girl who seems to be the main subject is out of focus; the boy behind her wielding the toy gun is blurred; the two kids in the background who are in focus seem disinterested in what is going on; and two other people are shown only partially, with their faces cropped off. You can't help but wonder about what is going on, and what relationship these six people have with each other.
Nixon, however, gives you no answers. Captions are limited to location and date; how you interpret the photos is up to you and your imagination.
In his Introduction, Robert Adams writes that Nixon's photographs tell stories. I think that's an apt description of these intriguing images.